Evaluation of chocolate as a source of dietary copper

Weber, Thomas ; Solioz, Marc

In: European Food Research and Technology, 2014, vol. 238, no. 6, p. 1063-1066

Zum persönliche Liste hinzufügen
    Summary
    Chocolate has frequently been proposed to be a valuable source of dietary copper, but data on the copper content of major contemporary chocolate brands are scarce. The copper content of 22 brands of chocolate, many of which are sold worldwide, is thus presented here. A reliable hot ashing procedure to determine the copper content of chocolate by inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectroscopy is also described. It was found that the copper contents of the chocolates analyzed here varied in the range of 1.85±0.10 to 16.50±1.29μg/g. There was a linear correlation of the copper content of chocolate to its cocoa content with a correlation coefficient R 2 of 0.89, showing that the copper was largely contributed to the chocolate by the cocoa. The value of chocolate as a source of dietary copper is discussed.